In 2008 I was studying at The Joe Kubert School of Cartoon and Graphic Art and Halloween was on its way. Halloween at The Kubert School was a big deal. Everyone would come into class in costume and there would be a huge school photo and costume competition on the front steps (yes, we were in our 20s – yes, it was awesome!) I dressed as Poison Ivy (with Arkham Asylum pajamas because no way was I going to class in a bikini – but I still wanted to be green!) and my housemates took me trick or treating afterwards as I had never had an American Halloween before.
One of the Halloween assignments we were given by our awesome humor and caricature teacher, Doug Baron (Sugar Ray Finhead) was set to last a few weeks after Halloween was over (keeping it in our hearts all year). We were tasked to draw a caricature of Stephen King surrounded by his creations. We were shown previous years examples – which were all excellent – and told that it would have to be a large painting using Dr. Ph. Martin’s Dyes.
My result was this piece.
I look back on it now and of course it is far from perfect. I had yet to find my own style (I’m still trying to find it) and I was, quite simply, not a good artist yet – after all that’s what experience and art school is for. But I am still proud of it. In 2010 I was contacted through DeviantArt by Finders Creepers, a gallery in Iowa, about purchasing the piece for an upcoming show called ‘Hail To The King: A Stephen King Art Exhibition’. That made this piece my first painting I sold to a gallery so I will always remember it fondly.
‘Hail To The King: Revisited’ (2012)
Despite my love for the original work I had created as a college assignment, I had always wanted to retry it digitally. I had moved away from dyes since leaving college and wanted to try out some new tricks I had learned on Photoshop. So, in 2012, I decided to re-draw ‘Hail To The King’.
I added in some fog texture and included some tentacles from the movie ‘The Mist’ as well as experimenting with light for Christine’s headlamps. It was one of my best works at the time and I spent a long time problem solving in a program I was still very new to.
Little did I know how popular this image would become. Years later I was informed that it had been shared from its original DeviantArt (acatris) post via 9Gag (without any credit), and consequently had appeared on t-shirts, mugs, even light switch covers of all things! Doing a reverse image search on this now tells me that it has been shared on Pinterest, recreated on Etsy and posted on fan sites – all from the original 9Gag post, which is… disappointing, but I suppose that is just how the internet works sometimes (p.s. if you are from 9Gag, hi! Reverse image search is not hard…)
All that being said, I am glad that people enjoyed this piece (though I wish you had known it was by me). Looking at the (many) comments people have put under its re-posts over the years lets me know that you do, so thank you for that. I wish I could put all of the suggestions for different characters in there that I have seen. There have been some great ones.
‘Hail To The King: The Revenge: Part III: The Return of the King’ (2021)
In 2020 I decided to finally revisit this piece again. I have always loved it and it is a brilliant exercise for me as an artist in likenesses and design (fitting all those characters in one image is not easy). It was also inspired by the meme ‘How it Started vs. How it’s Going’ which a few artists had taken part in. I used it as an excuse to add in a fair few of the suggestions I have had over the years (though not all of them – again – only so much space!) as well as the new Pennywise alongside his Tim Curry counterpart (I just love both!)
Maybe I will revisit this again some day in the future. There are plenty more Stephen King movies I could possibly add in – but not for a while. This has taken me 4 months to complete in-between other jobs, so a little break from his excellency the most high of horror writers is in order.
The artwork will be available as a signed A4 print on my Etsy Store on March 1st, launching for the Macabre Market Online Event. So be sure to click ‘Going’ on the event to be notified when it is available – or follow my Etsy store for notifications of new stock.
P.s. For those of you coming here to check a list of references (as I know a lot of people have played the ‘list the movies’ game with this pic over the years), here you go! Note that most of these references are to the movies, not the books, e.g. The Grady twins are not in the books).
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